In The Galleries: Silvia Prada, 'The New Modern Hair'

Prada and her collaborators explore the visual representation of male identity.

BY Christopher Harrity

January 22 2013 7:18 PM ET

"The New Modern Hair" is an artistic representation of the subtle nuances and cues that help define the male persona, identity and representation within the parameters of visual and popular culture. With her book The New Modern Hair: A Styling Chart as departure point, Prada has created a series of drawings, poster montages, and large-scale murals, capturing the typecasting and idealized character building that has become ingrained in our minds through media, pop culture, and iconography.

The portraits — with titles ranging from The Flat Top to The Sportsman and also to Executive Contour – pay homage to vintage barbershop imagery and are juxtaposed with didactic geometric drawings; all loony remixes of 20th-century art movements such as Bauhaus, De Stijl and Russian Constructivism.

The exhibition features contributions by visual artists Marc Balet, Bruce LaBruce, Brian Kenny, Robert W. Richards, and Slava Mogutin among many others.